the killing of a sacred deer
by stingings
Summary: Claudia's actions to save Soren begin to take a toll on her.


The dreams begin the second night of their journey home. They are always the same. She sees Soren, his broken body limp on the ground, the fear in his eyes. She reaches out to touch his face, to try to help him, muttering indecipherable incantations. As her fingertips touch his forehead, suddenly Soren is gone, and in his place is a faun. The creature's eyes are fearful, but it's only for a moment; Claudia's fingertips, brushing gently across its head, glow purple, and then it's dead. Instinctively, she knows that she has killed Soren, too. With this realization, Claudia bolts awake.

Listening for the sound of Soren's breathing from the bedroll next to hers, Claudia relaxes when she's sure that she can hear his soft snores. He grunts slightly as he tries to roll over, and the pain from his healing ribs stops him. That he can even try to roll over is a miracle, Claudia reminds herself, a miracle that _she_ worked. Giving Soren his body back had been magic like she had never done it before. The raw life she had been filled with, the rapid heartbeat of a young deer, surging through her, it was terrifying and thrilling all at once. She hadn't known that she had been capable of holding such power, and when it had left her, its absence left a sharp, hungry hole in her.

Soren stirs again, and Claudia wonders how long until the sunrise it is. The journey back is going to be long, considering that neither of them are at their peak performance levels. She gets up and leaves the camp quietly, careful not to disturb her brother, since he needs all the rest he can get, and besides, she knows from experience that waking a sleeping Soren is not something you want to do unless you have to.

Wandering through the woods around their camp, she searches for creatures to replenish her stores with, but the night is strangely empty. A stiff breeze sends a shiver through her body, and she regrets not bringing her cloak with her. Still, she does not return to their camp. Instead, she continues wandering until she comes to another clearing, nearly identical to the one they had chosen to stay in for the night. She sits down on the ground, leaning her back against a small boulder. The silvery light of the moon is bright, and Claudia is fascinated by the way her newly white hair glows in it. It could be beautiful, she thinks, if that's how it looked all the time. In the light of day it just looks dead.

She sits there in the clearing for hours, not really thinking about much, unaware of the passing time. It isn't until the first rays of the morning sunshine begin to creep over the trees that she snaps to attention. She has to get back to their camp before Soren wakes up. He'll worry if she's gone.

The journey back is quick, and Soren is still snoring softly, just like she left him. By the time the light is bright enough to wake him, Claudia has packed all their things and has breakfast underway.

"Magic pancakes, coming right up!" she says brightly, and Soren's face lights up.

They sit and eat, and Claudia doesn't remark on the amount of butter he slathers on his stack of pancakes, and Soren doesn't remark on her not remarking on this, which is odd. Still, she doesn't mention it, and they set off in uncharacteristic silence.

It's midday before Soren makes a pun, and it's nearly three by the time it's actually a good one. By evening, Claudia is exhausted beyond belief, and falls asleep almost as soon as she crawls into her bedroll.

She sees Soren's broken body again, tries to heal him again, kills the deer again, kills her brother again. She wakes up panting, looking for her brother, who sleeps peacefully across from her. The night edges on, but sleep doesn't return to her.

It happens again, and then again, and by the fifth night of interrupted sleep, Claudia doesn't know what to do. She leaves camp and paces the forest, repeating her calming mantra to herself. Eventual it works, and she can breathe again, and for the first time, she's able to get herself back to sleep. There are no dreams this time, and she wakes in the morning feeling better than she has all week.

And then the unthinkable happens.

It's mid-morning, and they're riding through particularly lush forest. Soren is making increasingly terrible attempts to haiku-ify their setting, and Claudia is counting syllables behind his back. Suddenly, Soren goes silent.

"What's the matter?" she asks him, but he doesn't reply.

To her horror, his body goes slack, and Soren slides from the saddle, his foot tangling in the stirrups.

"Soren!" she shouts, and leaps off her own horse to rush to her brother.

She frees his foot, and moves his body away from the horse.

"Claudia, I can't feel…I can't feel…I can't feel anything," he says, his eyes wide as he looks up at his sister.

He doesn't sound as scared as he did before, but Claudia knows her brother. She saved him before, and she will save him again.

"Don't worry, Soren," she assures him, "I'm going to fix this."

Her mouth settles into a grim line, and she runs away into the woods, praying that she will find what she is looking for.

She does.

—

Claudia returns to Soren, glowing with power, the heart of the deer beating within her. She feels life sparking at her fingertips as she stands beside Soren. She sees the fear on his face now, but she doesn't know why he looks so scared; he knows that she's going to heal him. Why should he be scared?

She releases the unbridled life-force that she's been holding, and the fear in Soren's eyes doesn't matter because she heals him. When it's over, Claudia collapses backwards, gasping for breath, darkness lingering at the edges of her vision. She hears Soren call out to her, but the sound is muted, like she's underwater.

"Claudia!"

Soren's voice is clear now, and Claudia looks up at her older brother, who can stand again, and she smiles.

"Great!" she says, "It worked!"

"Claudia, your hair…"

She glances down, and with a start notices that more of it has been drained of its color.

"Oh, that?" she says, trying hard to keep her voice from betraying her panic, "It'll be _fine. _I was doing some pretty powerful magic."

"If you say so, Claudia," Soren replies, "But if this spell wears off again, I don't think you should try to redo it."

"And why not? It works, doesn't it?"

"Yeah, but not permanently. Are you gonna have to do it once a week for the rest of my life?" Soren says, and lowers his voice, "Or for the rest of _your life_?"

"We'll be home soon, and Dad will fix it," she says with more confidence than she feels; _if you have to choose, choose the egg_, she hears in her head, "Relax, Soren."

He helps her to her feet and they set off again.

That night, she has the dream again, but she doesn't jolt awake when the deer dies. No, this time she lingers, and some unfamiliar feeling begins to creep over her. She thinks, maybe, it's grief. She's mourning Soren, dead and disappeared, but she's staring at the baby deer, it's body broken before her. She's crying, why is she crying? She doesn't cry over the animals she uses for her spells. Her grief is turning to panic because she doesn't know why she's feeling like this and before she knows what's happening she can't breathe, she can't breathe and she's choking and—

"Claudia!"

Soren's voice brings her back. She sits up in her bedroll, and wipes away the sweat from her forehead.

"You were muttering in your sleep, and then you starting thrashing around," Soren explains, "It was _way_ creepy."

He looks at her with concern, and she smiles at him.

"I'm fine," she says, "Just a bad dream."

It's not a lie.

"Go back to sleep," she tells him, "We've got a long day of travel tomorrow."

Soren lowers himself back down to the ground, and rolls over so that he's facing away from her. She's pretty sure he's only pretending to sleep, since his breathing is too even and he's not snoring. She pretends to sleep too.

—

The dreams continue the whole journey. Their final night before returning home, Claudia doesn't go to sleep. She can't bear to dream like that again. Instead, she wanders the woods. Maybe she should be afraid; who knows what lurks in the dark these days? But she isn't. She wanders absent-mindedly through the trees, listening to the sounds of life around her. She thinks about holding the pulsating life force of the deer within her. The memory makes her feel hungry and sick, all at once.

The trees are thick around her and Claudia loses sight of the moon overhead. The darkness is incredibly still. It crosses her mind to use a mage light, but she holds back, walking further into the blackness. A twig snaps, and the sound echoes through the night.

Claudia searches for its source, her eyes landing on a dark shape, standing stock still, not ten paces away from her.

It's a deer.

She draws a hissing breath. In the darkness, she can make out the fragile contours of its small body She takes a step towards it, then another and another and suddenly she's an arm's reach from the animal. Through the silence she can almost hear its heartbeat, that thudding vitality, so delicate and so strong. She remembers holding it within her.

Somehow, she knows that it won't run, and so Claudia stretches out her hand and makes a light so that she can see the deer properly. It's not a timid creature, but it is vulnerable. She thinks for a moment that maybe she could take this deer, and save her self the time and trouble of finding another one if Soren loses his body again. It would be easy, probably. Although she's not sure how she could store the life-force of the deer while she waited; it's not exactly a griffin's eyeball. She shrugs off the impulse. They're going to be home tomorrow, and their father will fix Soren. Everything will be fine. And she will never need to hold that pure, pulsing energy again.

She's gripped by an overwhelming sadness, but she's not sure over what. Before Claudia can think on it more, the deer bolts, and she's left alone.

The hollow, hungry hole within her seems to widen.

—


End file.
